Super Flat Times (2007)
“I have always felt sorry for the bee, which, I was told as a child, has only one chance in its life to sting. The expression frozen on the dead bee’s face seemed to bear this out. Its whole head was powdered with fine, cream-colored pollen, a bright reminder of its final indiscretion. Putting the bee in the wastebasket seemed wrong somehow. Instead, I lay on the floor next to the tiny corpse, resting my temple against the cold linoleum so that I could get a closer look and try to stop trembling... for a while.
Other animals are stupid, and shameful. The shark, for instance, which must keep swimming in order to breathe. Or the wild redhead duck. My mother often told me that if a wild redhead duck was wounded by a hunter, it would drown itself rather than be caught. She was trying to teach me a lesson, I think, but it never made any sense to me. I knew that when the moment came, I would allow myself to be caught, no matter how desperately I wanted to die. Whenever I think of the duck swimming madly toward the black lake bottom, though, I have to sit in the large leather head, holding on to my knees with both hands.MoreLess
Other animals are stupid, and shameful. The shark, for instance, which must keep swimming in order to breathe. Or the wild redhead duck. My mother often told me that if a wild redhead duck was wounded by a hunter, it would drown itself rather than be caught. She was trying to teach me a lesson, I think, but it never made any sense to me. I knew that when the moment came, I would allow myself to be caught, no matter how desperately I wanted to die. Whenever I think of the duck swimming madly toward the black lake bottom, though, I have to sit in the large leather head, holding on to my knees with both hands.MoreLess
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